2/29/2008

The Man in the Diaper Wants Indians to Have Babies:It's always funny when a married man who likes to wear diapers and pay whores to smack his ass until he sprays himself with jizz after he's shit himself attempts to take the moral high ground. And it's always sad when the Senate of the United States aids and abets the hypocrisy of the aforementioned diaper-wearing, jizz-spraying whoremonger. But Republican Senator David Vitter of Louisiana had hisself a cause, and that was to make sure that pregnant Indian women keep their fuckin' babies. No "allegations" of infantilism with hookers was gonna stop Vitter from holding his shit-smeared hands up in front of underage Indian country pussies like the crossing guard on a barely used country road.

See, after negotiations, veto threats, and other such shit, the Senate finally came to an agreement on the Indian Health Care Improvement Act, which, among other things, provides $16 billion to do what the title of the bill says. It's a big deal. But, of course, all seemingly good things that get through the Senate must have the taint of rabid conservatism stinking them up somewhere.

And that's where Louisiana Whore Loverboy comes in. Vitter introduced an amendment to permanently extend the Hyde Amendment banning federal funding for abortions through Indian Health Services. Or, in the amendment's words, "no funds or facilities of the Service may be used (A) to provide any abortion; or (B) to provide, or pay any administrative cost of, any health benefits coverage that includes coverage of an abortion." And then the exceptions: "The limitation described in paragraph (1) shall not apply in any case in which--(A) a pregnancy is the result of an act of rape, or an act of incest against a minor; or (B) the woman suffers from a physical disorder, physical injury, or physical illness that, as certified by a physician, would place the woman in danger of death unless an abortion is performed, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself."

Senator Byron Dorgan called the second part there "incomprehensible," and the whole amendment "unnecessary." In debate in the Senate, Senator Sam Brownback said it should be passed partly in memory of Henry Hyde, who is now featured in the cabaret extravaganza in Hell titled, "Henry Hyde Sings Cole Porter as His Balls Are Barbecued." Brownback and John Thune rose to announce how much they love enwombed Americans, and, on Tuesday, the amendment passed 52-42, with eight Democrats joining Republicans in the vote. At least it's still gotta be passed by the House.

There's much jubilation in the evangelical community, with bizarrely glib headlines like, "Senate Okays Health Bill for Native Americans Sans Abortion." Vitter himself crowed on his website, "The Hyde amendment represented a pivotal moment in the pro-life movement by restricting the use of federal funds for abortions, but a series of legislative loopholes has allowed this practice to continue in certain instances. The passage of my amendment will finally close this loophole."

Yes, it's always moving when people are forgiven for their sins or even when people forgive themselves. It's so empowering. And what better way to demonstrate the power one has when a self-described "Christian" is forgiven for fucking around with hookers and cheating on his wife than to punish women, the very temptations that make Vitter ache for the feel of his own shit pressed into his balls. So, hey, why not make sure the poor keep their goddamn babies whether they want 'em or not. Let's hope that Vitter doesn't keep apologizing to his nutzoid base or women everywhere are doomed.

Shoulda Listened to That Guy's Financial Advice:The Rude Pundit, in an e-mail to a friend, on November 1, 2004: "Either [John Kerry wins] or I start investing in euros on Wednesday." It's not quite as bad as "Hey, when that Yahoo stock goes on sale, I should buy some," but, still, some things are eminently predictable. That our economy would be in the shitter during a second Bush term? Pretty much a guarantee.

2/27/2008

In Brief: Why Jonah Goldberg Ought to Be Forced to Bathe His Mother:Because in his latest "column" (if by "column," you mean, "the dribbled ejaculate from the half-erect cock of a guilty school boy desperately masturbating to Internet photos of disemboweled, raped Iraqi women"), Goldberg goes above and beyond to try to taint Barack Obama by his association with a former Weather Underground member in Chicago. Goldberg writes, "I don't think such associations should cost people their careers or place in polite society. But shouldn't this baggage cost something?" (emphasis Goldberg's, 'cause he ain't in the room to yell this at you).

The whole exhausting exercise is an effort to tar all liberals with the actions of the most radically left. It's the rhetorical equivalent of making no distinction between KKK members and, say, John McCain. Goldberg is so pathetic, trying to sell copies of his specious little book, twying so vewy hawd to wive up to Limbaughs and Coulters that he even tosses in a lie about a Che Guevera flag at an Obama campaign headquarters.

Besides, do we even wanna start talking about the number of "reformed" criminals that are welcomed back into the Republican fold? Oh, right, that'd be because they weren't the radicals - those perps, like Elliot Abrams, G. Gordon Liddy, and others, were the Republican mainstream.

Oh, one thing: Why the fuck would you keep bringing up a Saturday Night Live sketch to make a point about media bias? Isn't there actual media bias rather than pretend bias to reference? Whoever has told Hillary Clinton to make references to the debate-mocking little skit has the sense of humor of, well, Saturday Night Live.

2/26/2008

Bullshit Games from the Political Establishment:Now, the Rude Pundit would never be confused with a big-time political consultant or "analyst." For one thing, as far as he can remember, he's never sold his soul to Satan (or James Carville - the distinction can be difficult to maintain), and he's not a megalomaniac fucking with the aspirations of Americans and dicking over a major candidate just to prove some personal theory, like Mark Penn, and he hasn't actually cut open small children in order to engorge himself on their gooey viscera, like Karl Rove. Hell, he doesn't even own a suit made by any designer whose name ends in a vowel. And if he had the track record of, say, a Bob Shrum, he'd like to think he'd just be too fuckin' embarrassed to call himself an adviser because, really, "advice" is generally understood to be beneficial to the advisee. You know, if you were an architect whose buildings kept collapsing into rubble, it'd be madness to hire you. But if you're a political consultant? Some stupid motherfucker's gonna pay you and your firm a few million to fuck up their campaigns.

But, still and all, the Rude Pundit thinks that for a couple of bucks, a blotter of acid, and a threesome with Kiran Chetry and Rob Marciano, he could come up with a less bullshit list of ideas for attacking a candidate than did Mark Halperin in Time magazine this week. In laying out how John McCain can attack Barack Obama in the general election, yeah, Halperin does go down the racist dog road, with advice like "Allow some supporters to risk being accused of using the race card when criticizing Obama" and "Emphasize Barack Hussein Obama’s unusual name and exotic background through a Manchurian Candidate prism." And Left Blogsylvania is right to be pissed by that kind of attack.

Seriously, though, is there anything in that list that doesn't scream "Obvious" as loudly as a drag queen discovering a sequined leotard that Judy Garland wore on eBay? Is there any doubt that one of the primary objectives of the Republican strategy will be to re-nigger Obama? When Halperin says, "Make an issue of Obama’s acknowledged drug use" and that McCain should "Dismiss Obama’s brief national tenure from his own lofty platform of decades in the Senate," he's just advising Republicans to make the case that electing Obama will be the ultimate in affirmative action. And by the time you get to suggestions like "Exploit Michelle Obama’s mistakes and address her controversial remarks with unrestricted censure," well, really, a relatively well-trained chimp could offer the same advice: throw shit and see what sticks.

This is what passes for advice from a major media muckety-muck. There's nothing to see here. It's like a list of bland, average sexual requests from a wife to her husband of ten years: "More oral" and "The clit's a little higher up than where your fingers have been fucking me for the last decade." Totally obvious and expected. Now, if that list says, "Let me put on a double-sided strap-on and slam your prostate until you jizz fireworks," then we're talking something new and different.

Of course, for big fun, there's always CUNT: Citizens United Not Timid, the "group" (defined as "two guys and an e-mail list") that claims it will tell us all "What Is Hillary". The fact that CUNT's founder, Roger "Don't Let Me Near a Phone" Stone, was interviewed as some kind of "expert" by AP's Nedra "Tickle My" Pickler, as well as on MSNBC, means the Rude Pundit oughta be on the BBC tomorrow.

The worst part of CUNT is not that it's sexist and degrading to Hillary Clinton. It's that it's just fuckin' stupid, like a bunch of nine-year old Catholic school boys just discovered there's a word "worse" than "pussy" and have to use it all the time now to talk about the nuns who took their chewing gum away. And then giggle.

Here's the thing about advice like Halperin's and tactics like Stone's: there's a good chance they're not gonna work anymore. And that's a subject we'll return to later.

2/25/2008

In Brief: Hillary Clinton Mocks:Really, Hillary Clinton? No, and, c'mon, really? Is this all you got? The last arrow in your quiver, the last bullet in your cartridge, the last rotten apple in your barrel? To make fun of your opponent because he dares to speak of hope and dreams?

When Clinton, pretending to preach like Barack Obama, said, "Now I could stand up here and say, let’s get everybody together, let’s get unified the sky will open, the light will come down, celestial choirs will be singing. And everyone will know we should do the right thing, and the world will be perfect, but I have no illusions about how hard this is going to be. You are not going to wave a magic wand and make the special interests disappear," she became every terrible mother who looks at her child who's shooting a basketball or pretend-singing in a microphone and says, "You'll never make it."

Oh, silly, starry-eyed Obama supporters, Clinton's trying to ruin your wet dream, she's trying to suck the life out of your party, and she desperately wants to shit in your corn flakes. The buzzkill to your Barack high, Clinton has decided that her role is to play the grown-up to all the stupid juveniles who think they might actually get a chance to upset the apple cart. She may as well be telling the teenagers in Bomont that dancing is against the law.

No, Obama's no Martin Luther King, Jr., but applied to King's most famous speech, Clinton's words might be, "I could stand up here and say that I have a dream, that I can just dream up a world where black and white children will play together, and then all my dreams'll come true and we'll let freedom ring and all of a sudden we'll be free at last. But I know how hard this is."

Jesus, it's like watching tumescent-cocked schnauzer try to fuck an unwilling tiger. There's a point where you just stop feeling sorry for the little bastard and realize it's gonna get what it deserves.

2/22/2008

Photos That Make the Rude Pundit Want to Down a Case of Star Beer:

Why is the President of the United States about to sign that young boy's head in Ghana? Or does he think there's oil in his skull and he's about to "explore" with the tip of his pen? And, more to the point, why is he so enamored of tee ball?

At a roundtable with the press at the end of his Dark Continent adventure, President Bush was asked if anyone in, you know, Africa had brought up the possibility of an African American being elected to his office. Bush replied, with all the stumbling self-doubt of a 14-year old boy trying to undo the bra of his girlfriend, "That never came up...I'd just like to remind you what Kikwete said. He said, 'I hope the next President is as good as this one.'" That'd be Jakaya Kikwete, president of Tanzania, and another way to read that is: "Oh, fuck, it can't get any worse."

Then, asked about his legacy, Bush, his tongue bouncing around his mouth like a hooked trout being yanked out of a lake, responded, "I would just tell you this - and you've heard me say it and it's true - there's no such thing as short-term political history. I mean, short-term history of an administration - forget 'political' - there is such thing as short-term political history because there's an end result, win or lose. There's no such thing as an accurate history of an administration until time has lapsed - unless you're doing little-bitty things." It's not unlike watching a badger caught in a trap gnaw its own leg off.

Finally, Bush's mind turned to other things, like napping. When he was asked how he thought Americans viewed his trip, he said, really, "I don't have any idea. What are you writing about it? I don't know what they think of it. Ask another question. I really don't know. I'm focused on the trip. When I get home, I pick up a book and start reading it, and I'm sound asleep shortly thereafter. So I'm not -- I don't know. I really don't know." There's no ellipses there. That's the unedited answer.

Amid a season filled with the ripe anticipation of nascent change in the country, some things stay the same.

2/21/2008

The McCain Story Ain't About the Fucking:Wednesday night is rum night at Casa de Rude, and last night the lunar eclipse was as good a reason as any to invite company over. In honor of the week's events over in Cuba, the Rude Pundit and his guests, a straight mixed-race couple - he's black, she's white - from uptown, enjoyed sips of what was supposed to be black market Havana Club, but, really, it just tasted like mid-level Bacardi. Such is life. It had a kick. It was smoky enough, and it fortified us against the coming walk in the cold. Just before we heading outside to check out the darkening moon, the first reports came in: look at the New York Times, they said, John McCain is not who he says he is, and then they showed a picture of Vicki Iseman, whom we all agreed was eminently fuckable.

Now, the Rude Pundit doesn't really give a shit who John McCain fucks or doesn't fuck. The fact that McCain might have tagged some hot lobbyist poontang a decade ago doesn't matter except to the nutzoid "values" right. It probably should matter to McCain's creepy-ass wife, but since she was once the hot 'tang to McCain's then-first wife, she had to be expectin' this. All of us awaiting the eclipse agreed: who the fuck cares?

Then the Rude Pundit had to go and say, "Yeah, and thanks, New York Times, for puttin' the image of McCain's scarred, bony ass gimpily half-thrusting between that chick's legs in my head." After a pause, the Rude Pundit added, "Old fucker probably can't come unless she shoves bamboo into his sphincter." It was a mood spoiler, and we downed our rum more quickly after.

No, none of that fucking matters, the fucking, and it's pretty much like the New York Times thought, "Aw, hell, we gotta do something to make people read this story about the arcane rules regarding favors and campaign contributions, so howzabout some hints at some lobbyist ballin'?"

What's important is that, more and more, it seems like John McCain's push for campaign finance reform was to protect himself from himself - since the Keating Five scandal, the man has raked in lobbyists-and-their-clients' cash like a cheap whore on buck-a-blow night at the brothel: "In late 1999, McCain twice wrote letters to the Federal Communications Commission on behalf of Florida-based Paxson Communications — which had paid Iseman as its lobbyist — urging quick consideration of a proposal to buy a television station license in Pittsburgh. At the time, Paxson's chief executive, Lowell W. 'Bud' Paxson, also was a major contributor to McCain's 2000 presidential campaign...McCain wrote the letters after he received more than $20,000 in contributions from Paxson executives and lobbyists. Paxson also lent McCain his company's jet at least four times during 1999 for campaign travel."

The Rude Pundit may be reading this wrong, but it doesn't seem to square with McCain's assertion today that "At no time have I ever done anything that would betray the public trust or make a decision which in any way would not be in the public interest or would favor anyone or organization." (And what a bizarro thing to say - as a member of Congress, McCain is constantly put in a position where he has to favor some individuals and organizations over others.)

Yeah, according to McCain's lawyers, he didn't support everything Iseman's clients wanted. But if you're on your knees with a row of johns lined up with dollar bills taped to their cocks, you're not exactly honorable because you found a few of them a little too scabby to suck.

As many others have said, right now this might become a real story - it's just not all out there yet. But most of the mainstream media outlets are gonna boil it down to who banged who, not who got fucked and who did the fucking. And now with McCain calling "Bullshit" on the Times, it's time for the paper to put it all out there. Just make sure it's less about John McCain's dick and whatever pussy it's been placed into and a little more about who he's holding hands with.

By the way, the lunar eclipse was quietly lovely and mysterious and disconcerting at the same time. When it involves the moon, of course, an eclipse is not about bringing darkness and night about. We were already in the dark. It's merely the ability to see a shadow cast across that which glows, maybe to see it a little differently.

2/20/2008

Why Michelle Malkin Needs to Be Caged Like a Rabid Shih-Tzu With a Note on the Continuing Need to Sodomize Bill O'Reilly with a Microphone (Michelle Obama Edition)-Now with O'Reilly-licious Update:So Michelle Obama said, in full, "What we have learned over this year is that hope is making a comeback. It is making a comeback. And let me tell you something—for the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country. And not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change. And I have been desperate to see our country moving in that direction and just not feeling so alone in my frustration and disappointment. I've seen people who are hungry to be unified around some basic common issues, and it's made me proud."

And Michelle Malkin, in her latest "column" (if by "column," you mean, "a stench-ridden concoction of bile and piss madly whipped into a rabid beast's mouth froth"), responded by asking when Michelle Obama might feel proud, "How about every Memorial Day? Every Veterans Day? Every Independence Day? Every Medal of Honor ceremony?" The typical knee-jerk bullshit that's to be expected from a right-wing fuck doll who regularly asks Uncle Sam if she's fellating him good enough, hard enough, oh, Sammy, does Malkin lick your balls like you want her to? Most every American who hasn't partaken of the nationalist chowder that Malkin and her ilkin suck down every day shrugs their shoulders at those events and wonders if Wal-Mart's open (don't fuckin' worry - it is).

Malkin goes on, and, really, this needs to be quoted at length to fully understand the rank stupidity of the right: "When millions of Americans rallied to help victims of the 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia -- including members of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group that sped from Hong Kong to assist survivors -- my heart filled with pride. It did again when the citizens of Houston opened their arms to Hurricane Katrina victims and folks across the country rushed to their churches, and Salvation Army and Red Cross offices to volunteer." That's right: Malkin's heart swelled because some people didn't behave like dicks during Hurricane Katrina.

Seeing a chance to build a wooden barricade on the tracks of the Obama locomotive, Bill O'Reilly jumped in with his usual demands, like he's always holding America hostage. He asks of Michelle Obama, "Why is an explanation needed, you might ask? Well, because most Americans are proud of their country and don't like it see it run down in any way." Which, of course, begs the question: what fuckin' country has O'Reilly been living in the last few years? Goddamn, ask people something more than "Are you proud of America?" and see how they answer. Given a choice between loving and hating their country, citizens aren't really that nuanced. But for O'Reilly, gray areas are to be avoided like a drag queen avoids five o'clock shadow.

It was a dumb fucking thing for Michelle Obama to say, to give such an opening to people like Malkin and O'Reilly (not to mention Bulldog McCain and his frightening she-beast wife - oh, hey, here's a possible McCain slogan: "John McCain: He's Only 10 in Dog Years"). Of course she was referring to being proud of the movement her husband's spark, but in an incredibly badly-worded way.

But, at the end of the day, is it not possible for a black woman in America to feel real pride in her nation only in finally seeing how the nation is embracing a black man for something other than his mad b-ball skills? And is that so shocking?

Update: Really, Bill O'Reilly? Well, at least he didn't say it was time to castrate Barack.

2/19/2008

A Word on the Obama/Clinton Divide:The next time someone wants to bitch about the "venom" coming from supporters of Barack Obama, like, say, in the pages of the New York Times, point them in the direction of Taylor Marsh's blog over on Huffington Post (or her own page, which, fuck it, the Rude Pundit doesn't feel like linking to now). Marsh attacks Obama and his supporters with such hatred that you wonder if she'll bivouac on a remote island if her Hillary-goddess doesn't get the nomination.

Obama's cribbing of a few lines of speech from Deval Patrick is a legitimate story. It has been legitimately brought up and legitimately dealt with by Obama and Patrick. Fuck, it's good that Clinton, in her desperate attempt to keep her campaign relevant, made noise about it because, if Obama's the nominee, it'll be a story that's over and done with (one hopes).

Marsh goes positively nutzoid, leaping up and down like someone who walked in on Dick Cheney fucking a barrel of oil, screeching, "Ah, ha, told you so." She calls Obama a "con" and "huckster" whose supporters are "suckers." The Rude Pundit normally agrees with Marsh. He's sported intellectual wood for her on many occasions and will again. But, really, and, c'mon, at some point, what the fuck? And that goes for Hillary-hatas, also. Don't do the right's job for them.

The Rude Pundit ain't supportin' Clinton for the nomination. He thinks that Clinton's a divisive figure, damaged goods, through little fault of her own, that she's surrounded herself with craven idiots who have no read of the political zeitgeist, and that her campaign is in a death spiral. Those are attacks on her candidacy and campaign. He's said that Clinton creeps him out personally and he doesn't trust her with power. He's called her "Robo-Clinton" because of her delivery style at speeches. That's the worst. But the Rude Pundit has a line, especially when it comes to Clinton's followers, that he won't cross. Why? Because at some point, he might have to support her. And he doesn't wanna seem like a scum-sucking hypocrite. Besides, there's so much scorn and contempt to be heaped upon Republicans.

And, of course, we should be going after the mainstream media for their endless attacks on Clinton and, to a lesser extent, Obamamania.

Passion in politics is goddamned great. It's like that awesome kind of sex where you don't know if you're fucking or fighting but either way it feels incredible. But you don't wanna slam your fuck partner around so hard that you break his or her limbs or rupture something inside. 'Cause otherwise, how are you gonna fuck again?

No, this ain't about holding hands and singin' fuckin' campfire songs or acting like polite pussies. Let the campaigns go at each other. Let us go at each other: Clinton's craven votes for the war are fair game for the nastiest kinds of rhetoric. Fears over Obama's seeming lack of experience are the kinds of things that oughta be aired now. But at some point here, we're all gonna have to play ball together at Democrat Park. Let's not make it so the field is ripped up.

2/18/2008

Presidents' Day Photo Quiz: Which One Doesn't Belong?:

The picture was taken at the Lincoln Medal ceremony on Honest Abe's 199th birthday, where a savage little gray-haired man who gets to fart in the same room where Lincoln farted bleated out these infantile words of praise: "He was a fabulous man, and a great President."

Presidents' Day is a fine time for comparisons to see the swift and deadly degradation of the office, and to remember, as we head into the rest of this election year, that whoever gets to breathe that rarefied stench of the Oval Office makes the nation see itself in his or her image. Right now, the United States is an alcoholic man-child twisting in rage at his own impotence and lashing out at anyone who would challenge him. One hopes we can do better.

2/15/2008

Hillary Clinton's Rove Has Destroyed Her:Hillary Clinton makes it so easy to dislike her when she says, as she did yesterday regarding Barack Obama's candidacy: "Speeches don't put food on the table. Speeches don't fill up your tank, or fill your prescription, or do anything about that stack of bills that keeps you up at night...There’s a big difference between us — speeches versus solutions. Talk versus action. You know, some people may think words are change. But you and I know better. Words are cheap." So that's where her argument now rests: Hillary Clinton is the kid who always whines that only the popular people get to be on the student council.

She seems to be channeling this fat fuck:

Close your eyes. Imagine him in high school. Imagine him saying exactly what Hillary Clinton said yesterday. Got it? Makes you wanna give him a wedgie yourself, doesn't it? And, yep, it pretty much explains Clinton's "strategy": Revenge of the Nerds.

That's Mark Penn, who, as the Rude Pundit and many, many others have said, is a fuckin' charlatan of the Bob Shrum School of Political Consultancy for Pathetic Losers. Here's a quote from page 3 of his tome Microtrends, written with E. Kinney Zalesne, part of that pseudo-Malcolm Gladwell (but not as clever) type of book of shit-what-I-pulled-together-to-explain-the-world:"There is perhaps no feeling more acute than being left out. Everyone remembers what it felt like not to be picked for a sports team, or to be excluded from a friends' night out, or to be the only one not invited to a wedding. What compounds the angst, of course, is the injustice - why me? I am a better ballplayer, a more loyal friend, a more gregarious guest - and yet I'm the one left out." It's pretty much exactly what Clinton said. This segues, really, into a discussion of trends in an attempt to explain why women are single.

It's sad, really, how badly Penn wants to be Karl Rove when he's just, at the end of the day, like every cartoon villain who thinks he can control dark forces that will make him blow up or become a dessicated corpse. In Penn's case, let's go with "blow up."

And so it's even sadder that Hillary Clinton invested so much of her presidential ambitions in this wannabe intellectual, this bloated boob, who says smart sounding things like calling groups of people shit like "Impressionable Elites" and "Permissive Parents," spouting vaguely coherent pop sociology like, "Numbers help you land on something that is incontrovertibly true." Well, that is until they don't.

The reason that Barack Obama has a movement behind him is that he went for a unifying movement. Clinton, listening to Penn, who saw how Rove eked out "wins" through targeting small, specific groups, is now in the position of trying to string together the Caffeine Crazies and the Unisexuals and the Working Retired into a crazy patchwork of a majority while creating the illusion of a movement.

It ain't gonna work. And, while the Rude Pundit believes Clinton needs to bail now on the race for the nomination, if she wants to have any chance at all, she needs to hang this Penn bastard up like a pinata and give her staff long sticks.

(By the way, don't write to tell the Rude Pundit that the "nerds" get to grow up to be Bill Gates or Steve Jobs or some such shit. Most of the nerds you knew in high school are working at Best Buy to pay off their student loans.)

2/14/2008

This Year's Kerry:There's something transcendently, exquisitely, and pathetically stupid in the fact that Hillary Clinton is continuing her campaign. Really, the only reason it isn't completely over is that she won New Hampshire. Had she lost there, we would have been talking about Obama and unity and more. But she didn't and now her campaign is banking on the quixotic, Giuliani-like late convergence of Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania wins to make her pursuit of the nomination at least appear like it's not coming down to she and her husband calling in all the favors done for superdelegates.

(By the way, Texas deciding the future of the country? Goddamn, sometimes it aches that Molly Ivins ain't here tell us how insane this has become.)

Otherwise, that's all it is: stay in the race until the convention, Obama's momentum and wins be damned while the voters, whether in caucuses and primaries, can go fuck themselves, and then use the superdelegates to, in essence, barge into the convention and stop the democratic process through deals cut on the phone, through the Blackberry, in the nicotine-gum-stinking back rooms. Sure, it's all legit through the arcane rules of the Democratic party's nominating process, but it's a huge fuckin' weasel clause, so very Bush-like, so very Rovean, so very vast right-wing conspiracy.

Ultimately, though, beyond the Democrats' fucked-up nomination manual, beyond the tearing up of the party that Clinton seems to be willing to engage in on the way to the convention, even beyond the conservatives salivating at the prospect of a Clinton nomination or presidency (which they see as a means to re-invigorate a desolate Republican party), Clinton needs to stop because she lost. Because this time Democrats are going with their hearts and not their heads. And you know what? That's what's gonna win the presidency.

Four years ago, we were presented with a stark choice between Howard Dean and John Kerry (with poor John Edwards always the bridesmaid). Dean excited crowds, got young voters behind him, and was seen as a breath of fresh air to the whole process. He would have beaten Bush into the fuckin' ground. But the combination of Kerry's money and the press's evisceration of Dean post-Iowa made Democrats scramble for the safety of Kerry's long goddamn arms. Dean made us hot and sticky in places that were unfamiliar to us. "No, no," we cowered, "Dean makes us come too hard and makes us want to fuck again right away - we can't handle it." Luckily, John Kerry had made us soup to soothe our scared loins. And whether or not you think the 2004 election was stolen, it shouldn't have even been close.

Yeah, it's fucked up in any way to think of Hillary Clinton as the "safe" choice, being the first woman to have a shot at the presidency. But that's how she's portraying herself with her "Tested, Ready" line. She's the one who was in the White House for eight years (although, c'mon, while being First Lady shouldn't exclude one from running for president, neither is it really experience, like being the spouse of a member of the military doesn't mean you know what it means to shoot the enemy. Sorry - unless you're finger's on the trigger and the other soldier's in your sights, you only have vicarious experience) and eight years in the Senate, where her positions have veered from politically expedient to occasionally daring.

Clinton's crusade, and it is a crusade, is seeming less and less about anything other than demonstrating that she can win. What else can it be when she spins Obama's eight straight wins as meaningless? Hell, her ex-campaign manager said as much by using as an excuse for stepping down that she thought they'd be done after Super Tuesday. And when Clinton gently mocks Obama for the indefinite idea of "hope," well, she not only seems safe, she seems like another cranky old person wanting to piss on the party the youngsters are having.

2/13/2008

In Brief: Is It Real or Is It Parody?:A quote: "As previously stated, glamorizing and normalizing homosexual conduct in our public schools is a full time endeavor. But the schools represent only one field of battle in the war over America’s body, mind and soul.

"With the aid of a willing mainstream media and a like-minded Hollywood, societal desensitization has been largely achieved. Blockbusters like Tom Hanks’ Philadelphia, the late Heath Ledger’s Brokeback Mountain, and television programs like Will and Grace and Ellen represent a modern-day fairy tale, creating a dishonest and sympathetic portrayal of a lifestyle which is emotionally, spiritually and physically sterile."

It's real. It's called "Unmasking the 'Gay' Agenda." It's by Matt Barber of the Concerned Women for America (make your own joke).

All the Rude Pundit can say is: "'Fairy tale'? Is that the best you could come up with, Mary?" And the film Philadelphia may represent many things, but neither that film, about a man dying of AIDS, nor Brokeback Mountain, about repressed love and desire, would ever be mistaken for Cinderella.

Read the whole "column" (if by "column," you mean, "a gargantuan, gooey ejaculation of fear masking one man's latent homoerotic desire that'd make Michel Foucault say, 'Dude, repress a little.'" Seriously, Barber talks more about gays and lesbians than the head of the HRC. In other words, what we're sayin' here is he seems to like the cock). It's hilarious, sad, and sooo 1993.

2/12/2008

How Much for a Night with Chelsea?:In just half an hour or so of searching, here's what the Rude Pundit came up with under the criteria "not exactly nice ways to talk about Chelsea Clinton" on Fox "news" over the last decade:

February 25, 1999 on Hannity and Colmes: Regular contributor Ann Coulter on Chelsea's view of one of Bill Clinton's "victims": "She's probably taken heart by his claim to Juanita Broaddrick that he's sterile. Those rumors about her looking nothing like him seem to be resurfacing again." So, just to make this clear: Coulter said that Chelsea would be happy if Bill wasn't her father. Like so many of her batsthit crazy statements, it went virtually unchallenged, and Coulter neither apologized nor was banned from appearances.

July 28, 2000 on The Edge With Paula Zahn: Zahn said, "Chelsea Clinton is leaving college in the fall to help her mom's political campaign. Is the first daughter showing her devotion to her parents, or is she merely their political pawn?" This was followed by an entire segment devoted to Chelsea's status as potential pawn.

April 15, 2002: Bill McCuddy in his "Foxlight" column: "Chelsea Clinton is hanging with a new homie. Here's a couple that paints an interesting picture — the former first daughter and Sean 'P. Diddy' Combs. That's right. They hooked up at a local New York nightspot recently and chatted for a while. Hey, between Secret Service for her and entourage for him, they both have a posse." It's okay if Chelsea has "homies" and if she "hooked up" with Diddy. "Hooked up" generally means "fucked," although the lingo has different, looser uses, much like "pimped."

February 23, 2007 on The Big Story with John Gibson: Regular contributor Dick Morris: "We have Hillary Clinton saying Chelsea was at the World Trade Center on 9/11 and was saved because she ducked into a coffee shop [when] she was five miles away asleep in bed and the phone rang and a friend said turn on the TV." To the Rude Pundit's knowledge, Morris has never apologized or been suspended from appearances for saying that either Hillary or Chelsea lied about 9/11.

January 7, 2008 on The Big Story with John Gibson: Regular contributor Michelle Malkin: "Hillary dragged her mother out and Chelsea, to remind everyone, that she has a womb, that she is a woman, that she's a human being." Of course, Malkin saying that Chelsea went unwillingly onto the campaign trail and that Hillary is using her as a prop received no notice, and no apology or suspension was needed.

When former Fox "news" and current MSNBC correspondent David Shuster asked if Chelsea was being "pimped out in some weird sort of way," he was asking a legitimate question in a stupid, "lookie-me-I-so-hip," bullshit way, the uncomfortable reporter equivalent of Nixon saying, "Sock it to me." The question was as legit as asking Dick Cheney about his lesbian daughter when she was campaigning for a president that opposes her rights as an individual.

In context, yeah, MSNBC's Chris Matthews has been a dick about Hillary Clinton. And David Brock over at Media Matters, who helped blow Shuster's remarks from a little aside on one of the lowest-rated shows on television to big, bad sexism, has a lot of anti-Hillary karma to work off, Brock being one of the primary reasons that Clinton is such an unfairly reviled figure.

But the fact remains that Hillary Clinton agreed to a debate on Fox "news" despite all the not-very-nice things said about Chelsea (not to mention the "incredibly offensive" things spewed by Fox about Bill and her constantly). And she threatened to bail on MSNBC's debate, refusing to accept Shuster's apology and even Keith Olbermann's prostration. (The debate was canceled after Barack Obama agreed to another one on CNN.)

That means that she leapt at Shuster's remark as a way of keeping sympathy for her and her family in the news, a distraction from Obama's primary/caucus sweep this weekend. She used this Chelsea situation as a way to kick start some desperately needed fundraising.

2/11/2008

In Brief: Requiem For Commodore Nutt:

Of all the things to say about President Abraham Lincoln at a 199th Birthday Celebration, the doped-from-her-toes-to-her-tonsils Laura Bush offered this: "After the Union's devastating losses at Fredericksburg, President and Mrs. Lincoln, along with members of his Cabinet, were buoyed by the antics of P.T. Barnum's Commodore Nutt, a 29-inch tall singing and dancing circus star, who barely reached the President's knee." Seriously. This is what the First Lady of the United States offered to humanize Lincoln.

Yes, after 1300 or so were killed and nearly 10,000 wounded at the battle of Fredericksburg, Abraham Lincoln got his rocks off watching a midget, one of Barnum's freaks, dance. That's...charming.

Said an advertisement of Commodore Nutt: "The $30,000 Nutt, who is seen in the above illustration just bursting out of his shell, is beyond all doubt The Smallest Man in Miniature in the known world, and withal The most Pleasing and Fascinating.18 Years Old!Only 29 inches High!!Weighs but 24 1/2 Pounds!!!He is the merest pigmy of humanity; a very small Fraction of an Ordinary Sized Man. He was visited by over 50,000 persons the first week of his exhibition, and was universally pronounced the Most Attractive and Interesting human being ever known. He will continue to be seen At all Hours, every Day and Evening, in the character and costume of a Commodore, and at intervals appear in a variety of Songs, Dances, &c., in Character, the whole making an exhibition never equaled in the world."

In reality, Commodore Nutt was a miserable little man, jealous of Tom Thumb (who was, you know, a "General") because he wanted Thumb's woman for his own, forced to play second fiddle to the more well-known Thumb.

2/08/2008

A Conversation That Bodes Ill For the Coming Contest: A Play:Characters:The Rude Pundit - a wanton bloggerThe Rude Mom - an AARP member who previously voted for Clinton, Gore, and Kerry. And, once upon a time, JFK

Setting: The Rude Pundit is home at Casa de Rude, in the midst of a phone call with the Rude Mom.

Time: Last night, prior to an evening of vodka and Ukrainian karaoke that would make the Rude Pundit wake up late, thus delaying his bloggery for the day.

Rude Pundit: So you're voting in the primary.

Rude Mom: I think we'll be out of town.

RP: You know your primary actually matters this year.

RM: Oh, no, it doesn't.

RP: (After a moment of incoherent sputtering) Are you voting for Obama or Clinton?

2/07/2008

Bush Prays, Jesus Pukes:Whenever George W. Bush prays, somewhere out in the ether, Jesus Christ vomits. It's a nearly Pavlovian response, and, fortunately for Jesus, unless he's out in public, Bush rarely ever prays. This morning, though, Jesus's guts twisted in retching as the President spoke at the National Prayer Breakfast. "Aw, fuck," Jesus thought as his throat burned from the acid puke, "should have checked his schedule," remembering having that extra serving of falafel, slugging back the extra glass of wine last night.

Jesus tried to listen to the prayer without gagging. He got through Bush's initial words, but when Bush tried to explain the gathering, saying, "We believe that the Almighty hears our prayers -- and answers those who seek Him. That's what we believe; otherwise, why come?", well, even the strongest stomach would throw up.

"Wait, wait, wait," Jesus called out to God, who was catching up on American Idol on the Tivo, "did he just say the only reason to come together and pray is to get stuff? Aw, fuck." And he ran into the bathroom.

"Pick up the seat," God mumbled. People used to be kinder to Jesus when he blew holy chunks. Mary Magdalene would hold back his hair, but now that whore's too busy watching Obama speak. Besides, God thought, Jesus should have learned to stop being such a sensitive pussy a long time ago.

Bush continued, "In prayer, we grow in meekness and humility. By approaching our Maker on bended knee, we acknowledge our complete dependence on Him. We recognize that we have nothing to offer God that He does not already have -- except our love. So we offer Him that love, and ask for the grace to discern His will. We ask Him to remain near to us at all times. We ask Him to help us lead lives that are pleasing to Him. We discover that by surrendering our lives to the Almighty, we are strengthened, refreshed, and ready for all that may come."

That's some sick shit, Jesus thought. Coming from a man who specifically authorized that other men be drowned for information, a man who reserves the right to do it again if he wants to, it's just a fuckin' lie. And, seriously, man, Jesus wanted to tell Bush, that's some Taliban-soundin' fucktardery. Besides, Jesus thought, he doesn't have a Wii yet; can't he get a goddamn Wii before he gets any more love? "Aw, fuck," Jesus yelled, another wave of heaves hitting him. "Why doesn't he fuckin' stop?"

Said Bush, "We ask Him to heal the sick, and comfort the dying, and sustain those who care for them. We ask Him to bring solace to the victims of tragedy, and help to those suffering from addiction and adversity. We ask him to strengthen our families, and to protect the innocent and vulnerable in our country. We ask Him to protect our nation from those who wish us harm -- and watch over all who stepped forward to defend us. We ask Him to bring about the day when His peace shall reign across the world -- and every tear shall be wiped away."

Jesus wondered, between technicolor yawns, why every time conservatives talk about prayer, they make it sound like people can't do shit for themselves, but when it comes to the government actually doing shit to, you know, "help those suffering" and protecting "the innocent and vulnerable," it's all, "Hey, motherfuckers, do that shit on your own." Or pray. It's a vicious circle.

Bush went on: "Experiencing the presence of God transforms our hearts -- and the more we seek His presence, the more we feel the tug at our souls to reach out to the poor, and the hungry, the elderly, and the infirm. When we answer God's call to love a neighbor as ourselves, we enter into a deeper friendship with our fellow man -- and a deeper relationship with our eternal Father."

Jesus yelled at his computer, "No, no, no, you don't get to say this shit when you veto a bill to give more children health care because you're afraid some adults might get to go to the doctor, too. Fucker. Aw, fuck." And it was his no-longer-thorned-crowned head back into the porcelain. "Can you stop this?" Jesus called out to God.

"What do you want? I'm out of tornadoes right now. Besides, he's almost done," God answered, turning up the volume so he could drown out his son's horrible roars of puke.

Bush ends by saying how much prayer has helped him be President. One last dry heave and Jesus Christ knew he was done for the day. "I'm gonna go get lit," he told his father, heading into his room for his holy water-filled bong.

2/06/2008

In Brief: Obama Won (Updated):Even before the latest presumptive count of states and delegates came in, it was pretty damn clear that Barack Obama won last night. It wasn't even close, despite the close numbers. Remember: just a month ago, Clinton was up by ten to twenty points nationally. For last night to have been anything less than a Clinton blow-out means she lost. For her to have to keep fighting at this point means she lost. And for it to have been, more or less, a tie (with Obama winning slightly more delegates and lots more states), well, that means Clinton lost big time.

Sure, we could go over figures and demographics, and others will, but, at the end of the day, Obama was not supposed to be this strong at this point. Political campaigns are built on narratives. There is a simple story that needs to connect with the voters. Obama's narrative has more or less stayed on track since his campaign started. Clinton's has veered this way and that way, like some exquisite corpse constructed at Bedlam. It was supposed to be easy for her: presumptive leader leads into the convention. Now that she has had to change her narrative time and again means she is losing. And Obama is winning.

And the rudest thing that this blog can say today is this: Clinton needs to think of a classy exit strategy before this election not only rips apart the party for now, and for the future. More on that later.

(Good liberal caveat: Unlike the nutzoid Republicans who are flipping out over McCain, if Clinton does manage to become the nominee, this blog will support her like control top panty hose. Besides, either way, beating up on McCain's gonna be fun.)

A Brief Observation With More Later:Is it just the Rude Pundit or did you also hear the death knell of George W. Bushism last night? Was that a giant foot stomping the hell out of any legacy for the man? Sweet, sweet sounds.

2/05/2008

Pre-Super Tuesday Results Palate Cleanser: How Would Jesus Vote?:Man, the sight of the religious right twisting in the wind this election cycle is quite the spectacle. It's pathetic, appalling, and hilarious at the same time, like watching a homemade video of a fat guy trying to jack himself off while he blows his dog. That fat guy's gonna hurt himself, you think, and he's gonna end up with nothing more than a mouthful of retriever jizz. And, really, does he deserve anything else?

You can witness evangelical conservatives gasping for air over at iVoteValues.org, the website put together by the Family Research Council and Focus on the Family (joint motto: "Since Jesus never got to vote, we're just makin' shit up"). It's a wonderful resource for all things that "values voters" need to know before going into the voting booth. "Values," of course, to the religious right, means, "Shit we say the bible says you should do."

They answer all your questions, even things that you'd think a retarded monkey might already know, like, really, "What is Voting?" And because the incoherent answer to that simple question seems like it's been written by an insane preacher on a combination of scrips and meth, it deserves to be quoted in full:

"Voting is a simple act with a significant impact. Voting is the way that 'we the people' elect individuals who will lead our government, make our laws, and protect our freedoms. It is also one of the ways Citizen Christians can function as salt and light to bring about change in our nation.

"'It is a moral outrage that more Christians do not take their voting responsibilities seriously. If they did, this would be a very different nation, and a better one.' - James Dobson, Psychologist and Author

"Voting is a privilege that many people in other parts of the world can only dream about. Voting is a great privilege, but it is also a great responsibility. Exodus 18:21 (NIV) says, 'Select capable men from all the people--men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain--and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens.' Acts 6:3 (NIV) says: 'Choose...men from among you who are known to be full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them.' Voting is foundational to our form of government, and it is inexcusable for Christians not to obey the command of Christ to participate in government by voting (see Matt. 22:21)."

Goddamn, did these people really control a large swath of our political discourse for a generation? Because that's like listening to some filth-covered corner maniac screaming end of days declamations, and not a particularly articulate maniac, either.

The whole thing is like the Idiot's Guide to Democracy for Lickers of Christ's Wounds. For instance, after you've registered to vote, gotten a friend to register, and then voted your "values," iVoteValues tells you to "pray." To which the Rude Pundit can only say, "Word, motherfuckers." But, hey, it's not just praying for someone to get elected who ain't gonna blow shit up. No, no. It's a lot more precise, as in: "Pray that God would give us godly men and women as leaders who fear the Lord and honor Him (Proverbs 29:2)" and "Pray that all our leaders would come to know Christ and follow Him (1Timothy 2:3-4)." So that whole "Judeo" in "Judeo-Christian" is just like putting a Guns and Ammo cover on a chicks with dicks magazine.

Speaking of, the FRC and FotF provide plenty of rhetorical ammo for Christian voters who wanna speak out for the act of voting. Many of them are admonitions from people like Noah Webster, who said, "When a citizen gives his suffrage to a man of known immorality he abuses his trust; he sacrifices not only his own interest, but that of his neighbor, he betrays the interest of his country." But, one presumes, if that "man of known immorality," like, say, drug use and alcoholism, finds hisself some Christ and starts to scourge hisself clean with a loofah o' Jesus's love, well, then it's all good to vote for someone like George W. Bush.

What runs through the website and through the desperate upper-lip sweat of Mike Huckabee is the gut-twisting fecal smell of fear. They have prayed themselves into insignificance, these devolved demi-people who float on waves of ignorance and willful blindness. The majority of this country is sick of them. And the movement is done. Jerry Falwell died in the nick of fuckin' time. The rest of the right has said that the lunatic Huckabee can go fuck himself. Sure, McCain and Romney will pay lip service so that religious right know that they can have a seat at the children's table should they be elected. And Obama and Clinton won't even allow them in the back door.

So, and it can't be said loud enough, hallelujah, praise some god or other or not, the religious right won't get to shove its superstitious, backwards ass agenda down our American throats once again. Now that's progress.

2/04/2008

Not an Endorsement of Hillary Clinton:Some things are beyond our control. Whether we like it or not, there's shit that's gonna fall on us that will change who we are - the death of a child, an awful auto accident, the fire that burns down the factory. It is hopelessly, horribly frustrating because, of the thousand things you think you could have done differently to change your fate, not one of them can be done now. And not that it would have worked. You're playing a fool's game - yeah, if you'd turned down a different road on the way to the store, you might not have been side-swiped, but, hell, you also might have been hit head-on.

Then there's those things that change everyone's perception of you, shit you didn't do, circumstances you couldn't have foreseen, the virulence of others. Ask Richard Jewell, who did not plant a bomb in Atlanta's Centennial Olympic Park. Ask Ralph Nader, who could not have anticipated how truly destructive a George W. Bush presidency would be. And ask Hillary Clinton, who, through little fault of her own, is as polarizing figure as one could ask for, if one is a Republican.

There's many, many reasons not to support Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination. Some are very personal: she just deeply creeps the fuck out of the Rude Pundit; he trusts her with power about as much as he trusts a coke addict who wants to borrow his iPod. Some less so, like the sense of entitlement that pervades her candidacy, as if we are voting for what she deserves, not what we do. Some are bogus: if having been the relatively politically inexperienced spouse of a President disqualifies you, then so should being the inexperienced son of one. Some are debatable: her health care plan, her war vote and her refusal to apologize for it, her husband's role in her administration. But one thing, above all others, makes the Rude Pundit give his touch-screen finger of love to Barack Obama, and it has little to do with what Hillary Clinton believes or does.

The Rude Pundit still believes the rotting corpse of a skunk could beat John McCain in the general election, but if anyone could lose it for the Democrats, it'd be Hillary Clinton. Because, despite what Ann Coulter says about conservatives running from McCain, somewhere in some cellar in some Little Rock or DC mansion, there's a machine that's been whirring its gears on low for the last seven years that's getting greased up and ready to kick into full speed once more, and it's aching to chew up Clinton, ready to get sticky with her blood and bones, for once it's really chugging, that fucker needs to be fed, ready to spew once again to willing, slavering media dogs who lap up that anti-Clinton vomit like it's kibble from Walter Cronkite's ass.

The thing is that, if it's Clinton vs. McCain, the press is gonna be fellating McCain with all the suction force of a Hoover on deep pile because of his come-from-behind victory, because he has been fondling their balls in the back of the Straight Talk Express since 2000. Because everyone is a product of their learned behavior, and if the Clintons react to the Obama speed train like it's run by Richard Mellon Scaife because that's what they know, the media will turn on Hillary Clinton even more so, because that's what they know.

Yesterday on This Week with George Stephanopoulos's Hair, Clinton tried to turn her PTSD over her treatment by the right and the media into a plus for her, a minus for Obama: "You know, general elections are much more contested. The other side has no compunction about raising any issue against whomever they're running against. And we haven't seen that tested and vetted experience in this primary. And frankly, you know, in his prior election in Illinois, Senator Obama didn't face anyone who ran attack ads against him. He ran against a very weak opponent without resources or credibility. So I believe that this will be a very tough fought general election."

Clinton's right, of course, that it's gonna be savage in the general election, but it's easier to attack Clinton because there's a precedent for attacking a Clinton, Bill and Hillary. We are inured to it. There is no precedent for attacking someone like Obama without it being, well, perceived as racist. And surely there will be blatantly racist attacks, as Clinton surrogates have done already, and surely the attacks on Clinton would be sexist, but, at the end of the day, we, the electorate, are products of our learned behavior.

We've learned to laugh at the Clintons, we've learned to hear the attacks and have them re-affirm our positions, good or ill. Plus, let's not forget the Don't-Break-the-Ice factor: if there is something in Bill or Hillary's recent or distant past that hasn't been vetted and dissected, and it does come out during a general election, it'll just cause all the old, discredited scandals and failures to rear their ugly, pus-filled heads.

Goddamn, Barack Obama is an inspiring motherfucker. Sure, he's basically just slightly outside the DLC establishment policy-wise, but what a unifying figure he could be, in the same way Clinton would divide the nation, perhaps to eke out that 51% victory. The way Obama appeals to an energized youth movement, the wounds he heals, the very nature of his ability to speak eloquently and authoritatively about those things that have harmed us and those that can unite us, it's all just so...fucking presidential - really, honestly, not-a-CEO, but a President.

Imagine that against crazy, angry, old John McCain instead of Hillary Clinton and her baggage. No, it ain't Clinton's fault. She didn't pack those bags. But they're hers to carry.

Late Post Today:No, the Rude Pundit's not having any problems with white women, but there's this legless Fijian man-dwarf who's gnawing at his brain, telling him he's got a meeting to go to. God, how he hates that fucker.

2/03/2008

Blogroll Amnesty Day Links:The Rude Pundit's not really sure he fully understands Blogroll Amnesty Day, but he loves him some Skippy, who, along with Jon Swift, asked him to participate. So here's five less-trafficked sites o' bloggery that the Rude Pundit reads on a semi-regular basis who deserve a little more notice in the big, bad, Darwinian Internet:

2/01/2008

That's Brad Pitt. He's a superstar. He's trying to get houses rebuilt all over New Orleans, starting with the Lower Ninth Ward. You can find more about it at MakeItRightNOLA.org.

That's Salt-N-Pepa. They're has-been rappers. For their VH1 reality series, they helped rebuild a home in St. Bernard Parish, next door to New Orleans. You can learn more about it at the St. Bernard Project.

When actor and comedian Denis Leary, the guy who used to make fun of Cindy Crawford on MTV, heard that none of the 22 New Orleans firehouses wrecked by Hurricane Katrina had been rebuilt, he put his Leary Firefighters Foundation on the case. So far, five have been built by volunteers. Said Leary, "I gave up on ever hoping that politicians in this country -- local, state or federal -- would step in to help these guys."

That's Steve Ellis. He's the Vice President of Taxpayers for Common Sense. Like President Bush, he believes government earmarks are bad for the economy, despite being one half of one percent of the budget.

Of one large earmark for Louisiana, Ellis asked, "What does that have to do with Hurricane Katrina?" This was about an $800 million dollar civil engineering project having to do with the waterways for future freight traffic through the Port of New Orleans. According to Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu, the project will "spur economic recovery" in the region.

One politician's pork is, as ever, another politician's manna. But, hey, as long as celebrities are coming in to do the work of governments, maybe we can get Sylvester Stallone or someone to rally volunteers to replace the Inner Harbor Lock in New Orleans. It's like building houses and fire stations, except with more dirt and water.